


Something Found

by Willowingends



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Depersonalization, Depression, Disassociation, Found Family, Gen, Good Friends, Isolation, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Strained Friendships, Survivor Guilt, it doesn't fix it but it gets better
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-17 03:48:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29219013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Willowingends/pseuds/Willowingends
Summary: "She’ll figure it out. She has to figure out. She just needs time to figure out what it is she needs to do. And she’ll start tomorrow. Tomorrow is another day."Isabel's been earthside for a while now, but she's never felt more disconnected from the earth and the people who inhabit it.
Relationships: Daniel Jacobi & Isabel Lovelace, Doug Eiffel & Isabel Lovelace, Doug Eiffel & Isabel Lovelace & Renée Minkowski, Isabel Lovelace & Renée Minkowski
Kudos: 12





	1. Chapter 1

After the families there were tears. Thankful tears, angry ones, fears laid to rest and hope smashed between her skilled hands. She had hated talking to the family members of her first crew, but she had owed it to them. To her crew. She had to get their story out before she went after the truth. She didn’t cry. She didn’t feel like she had the right. And she couldn’t tell the families why she, out of all of them, was alive. Because how did you tell someone that you were not the Isabel Lovelace that had left earth, literally? How did you tell mourners that the only reason their loved ones weren’t alive was because a bunch of aliens decided that she was the one to save, to restore, to -- change. It ate into her and left her numb, on unsteady ground, and that was not a place that Isabel liked to be.

So she held that piece of her puzzle to her chest. 

Next came the industry. That was simple compared to interacting with people again. The business was almost a joy to ruin. Blowing its records open, throwing open every door and window, basically shouting the truth across every media outlet that would have her. Teaching them just how resistant she was to laying down and filling her mouth with their lies. After everything, after the dust settled, the buildings fell, the news reports were given and the hands were tied in cold metal, there was nothing to do. Nothing left to do.

  
  


She didn’t know what to do.

  
  


For the first time in a long time Isabel didn’t have a damn clue as to what came next. She had never been a by the book, plan out every day type of woman, but she had always had an idea. And now… Now she didn’t even have that. Being a whistleblower of her caliber she had kept her name under wraps, played everything close to her chest, gotten everything out and done while basically remaining anonymous. It had been difficult and she had fought tooth and nail the entire way for that, but in the end she could go anywhere with her name still intact.

But all she wanted to do was go home. To lay in a bed, wrapped up in the feeling of safety. To hear laughter and warmth and feel arms wrapped around her in companionship. To feel connected in such a pure, human way. To feel  _ human _ again. To have a family of her own that had missed her. But she didn’t. And after five years of this crusade with no one asking after her, no one worrying about her and what she was doing except the members of the new Hephaestus crew that had came after her crew. Those who made it back. They had asked after her, but only because she knew they were as eager as she was to see Goddard fall. 

But they had families. They had lives. They had the things she didn’t.

It just reminded her that the thing she desperately wanted, she couldn’t have. She would never have that sense of humanity back. Because it was impossible.

Because she wasn’t human.

She’s reminded of that fact in the smallest of ways, but every day they’re there. The fact that when she accidentally cuts her finger when cooking and it heals into a tiny pink mark before she can get a Band-Aid on it, the fact that she knows it will not scar. No scar remains on her skin long, no matter how deep the cut. All physical evidence of her wounds from the Hephaestus are gone so completely that sometimes she thinks she imagined all of it. Those days she feels even less human because she feels as though she is floating above the earth she walks on. Her body is disconnected, the buzzing in the back of her head becomes loud, overwhelming. She feels like she could reach out and down the line of buzzing and find those responsible for how she has changed. But each time she tries she is left adrift in her own mind.

There is nothing on the other side. Not here, not while she is on earth. She is alone. 

Those are also the days that frustrate her the most. She loses so much time adrift in the buzzing static of her mind. The tingling will start in her fingertips as the sun kisses the city skyline with it’s noon light and the next thing she knows it will be evening, her apartment will be completely dark, and the moon will be the only light twinkling overhead. The moon and the airplanes that taunt and tease her with the promise of freedom that she misses. 

Isabel used to worry that the Listeners were speaking through her during these times, that she was missing important messages from them. Now she knows she’s just weak. That she’s alone.

Her fingers tangle in her hair as she sits at her kitchen counter. Her sandwich is soggy on one side and crisp on the other, having sat out for hours now. She kicks the bar once, the sting of her toes barely registering as she grits her teeth. 

“I am Isabel Lovelace. I am on Earth. I’ve survived death and hell and crazy scientists and terrible people. I’ve taken down a corporation that killed all my crew. I am Isabel Lovelace. I’m here, god dammit I’m here!” She recites until her voice climbs into a shout that shatters in a choked off sob. 

She swallows the sound. Slowly she stands from the table, dumping the sandwich in the trash, and makes her way to the bedroom. She’ll figure it out. She has to figure out. She just needs time to figure out what it is she needs to do. And she’ll start tomorrow. Tomorrow is another day.

Tomorrow is still unclaimed by the static. And she’ll fight it until she conquers it. It’s what she does best. She fights. She wins. She will win.

All alone. 


	2. Chapter 2

The sunrise brings no relief. Isabel stares at the square of light crawling across her ceiling, her eyes burning from the lack of sleep. Her stomach rumbles, reminding her she hasn’t eaten since yesterday morning. She groans, pulling herself up only when the doorbell rings. It takes her a couple of seconds of dizziness to remember that she has to stand up to answer the door. She doesn’t remember having scheduled anything today, who could be here? Maybe it was a neighbor, needing sugar or some other bullshit she probably doesn’t have. Maybe it’s her imagination again. Maybe it’s a dream and when she opens the door she’ll see Lambert or someone else. The static builds and builds and builds until it is all she can hear. 

The pile of clothes on her floor looks like it’s starting to harden. Her lips pull into a frown as she pulls her bedroom door closed. She’ll deal with it tomorrow. She’ll do her laundry tomorrow. 

Today was supposed to be tomorrow, but she hadn’t slept. She can put it off for another day. 

Another day. Today is another day. She wants to cry but she won’t. She’s a commander, she’s the leader, she can’t allow herself to cry. 

There’s no one left to lead. 

The doorbell rings again and she remembers what she was doing. She moves to the door and takes a moment to look through the peephole. There hadn’t been any threatening visitors despite everything, but she wasn’t ready to let her guard down. She was smarter than that. But it was a familiar face that gazed at the door with an impatient look and she opened the door with a confused grimace. “Eiffel, why are you here?”

“Well because you look like you’ve been ran over a couple of times and it’s not even noon yet.” The man replied, his voice droll as he looked her up and down. “And you haven’t been answering my calls, not cool Lovelace! You’re supposed to be my backup, my go-to when I don’t understand some reference old me left around the house.”

“Have you needed those services specifically?” Isabel asked skeptically.

“Well no but, it’s the idea that you’re supposed to be there for me Captain!”

She doesn’t mean to, but she flinches. An attempt is made to brush it off as a sudden cold chill, but Eiffel’s eyes are all too sharp for his casual expression. The Eiffel she remembers would have been pushy, would have tried to get her to talk right away. The Eiffel she knew would have tried his best to give her time, but his impatience would have won and he would have tried to cajole her into talking. This Eiffel, the one that has come to be, isn’t as subtle as he’d like to be but, dammit he’s trying.

“Listen, I said you looked like you’ve been ran over and I’m right. Let’s get some lunch and maybe you’ll look more alive.” His words remain casual but she can see the strain around his eyes. Guilt attempts to find a place in her heart at the look she sees, but she shrugs it off. He’ll be fine. He’s got Renee and Hera too. He’s not alone. He’s not--

“Fine okay, your treat.” The words are out of her mouth before she’s thinking and she wants to bang her head against a tree like a hopeless French idiot. But Eiffel’s already nodding, jokingly attempting to point out that she’s been getting the space backpay for a whole lot more than him. She turns on her toe, leaving the door open. “Let me get changed, I’m not you.” She shoots over her shoulder and comfort settles on her shoulders as he laughs and closes the door behind him. It’s not a bad thing to have someone in her house.

It’s almost nice.

The lunch isn’t bad. The lights are a bit bright, the sounds all around are a bit overwhelming. A car backfires and they both jump, him towards under the table and her to her feet, hand flying to where she had kept her own weapon on the Hephaestus. They’re the only two who react and Eiffel’s look is sheepish as he climbs back into his seat. “It’s so weird. I react like that even though I can’t remember why that’s my first instinct. I still have nightmares, even though I can’t really remember what they’re about.”

“Me too.” The words feel like iron in her mouth and they taste like surrendering, but the way he seems to look thankful for the connection softens the blow. “Nightmares I mean. Obviously I remember things better than you, Anastasia.”

He chuckles, “I recognize that one, but I don’t think I have a rich grandmother standing around to give me back my memories.”

“What about a captain with a shit ton of space backpay?” She quotes at him. “Movie night, you and me and some of the movies I think were your favorites.” He nods an agreement, and it feels like having a brother. 

Hell she looks forward to something for the first time in months. 

The movie night goes well. She even managed to clean up most of her house and make it presentable. She orders out instead of cooking, but she’s never been a good cook, so it doesn’t feel like a failure. Besides the greasy pizza and heavy breadsticks taste like ambrosia when accompanied by someone and not just consumed at nine in the evening alone in her kitchen. But Eiffel can’t keep his mouth shut, she doesn’t think he ever has been. Not when he sees something that concerns him, not when he sees something that he thinks he can fix. Isabel believes that there are some things always constant in a person, and Eiffel’s drive to  _ help _ even if he pretends to be lacadaisy, is his. 

Minkowski calls her two weeks after the movie marathon and Isabel knows, just  _ knows _ , that Eiffel talked her into reaching out. She and Minkowski hadn’t talked much since they had come back earth-side. They didn’t really have a reason once Goddard was out of both their lives. Sometimes the other woman would shoot texts her way, but nothing important. Nothing that really gave Isabel the idea that she would want to see her again.

After all, her appearance had really screwed things up for the Commander, hadn’t they?

_ (But Minkowski had come back, Minkowski had gotten to come home, and Minkowski had always been stronger hadn’t she? She had lasted out so much, and still come out more human, more whole than Isabel. Minkowski was just the type of person to be  _ better _ )  _

“Lovelace.” Her tone is clipped, quick. Isabel’s lip twitched up sardonically. This was really difficult for her wasn’t it? “I was worried when you didn’t pick up the first time. You’re usually so prompt.” 

Oh. Had that been concern then, not annoyance? “Sorry. My phone was--” beside her, but she had been zoned out, had never heard it ring, “in the kitchen. What’s this about?”

There’s a moment’s hesitance, a moment that hangs quiet between them, as though Minkowski is making a choice. And she makes the choice she has always made. She drives forward. “There’s this seminar on space travel that I managed to snag tickets to next week. Dominik isn’t interested and there’s no way I’m taking Eiffel or Jacobi. You wanna come with?”

“What interest would  _ we _ have in a space travel seminar?” A scoff finds its way out of Isabel.

“Make fun of them.”

Another silence, two seconds, five, and then there’s a smile pulling at her lips. Small, but present all the same, “Yeah, sure. Sounds like a real blast. Text me the details, I’ll see you there.”

It’s a short conversation, but one that leaves strange light bursting in Isabel’s chest. Hope, eagerness, a want to go outside and see the world for a little bit again. And for once the week doesn’t fly by. It drags in her anticipation for that day, even when she’s half prepared to cancel, half prepared to be let down. But Minkowski shows at the community center the seminar is being held at, she has their tickets in hand, and she even smiles when she sees Isabel.

The seminar sucks. It’s terrible. The man’s never seen a simulation of what long-term space travel and life is, much less lived it himself. Her and Minkowski spend most of the thing writing notes to each other on the notepad provided and their questions at the end are maybe a bit cruel. But don’t they deserve to see a scientist who thinks himself so better than them for his ideas stumble over the curveballs they throw at him? After everything, don't they deserve to laugh at him as he gets frustrated at their questions about rogue plants in vents and stars changing color suddenly?

They’re laughing with each other and Minkowski’s arm goes around Isabel’s shoulder and it’s almost like having a sister. 

Eiffel and Minkowski seem to decide to team up after that. They trade off weekends and who schedules some inane activity for her to join in on. She appreciates it, she does. But it doesn’t rid her of the heavy feeling in her bones, the static in her head. But it makes it -- bearable. It feels better. But she knows, somewhere in her head, that it’s just a thin veneer. It’s not until she comes home from a grocery trip to Jacobi sitting on her couch, his feet propped up on the table, that she realizes just how thin a cover over her emotions she has.

“What the fuck are you doing here.” She snaps, the bag of oranges dropping to the floor as she stalks across the living room to bend down and grab him by the collar of his shirt. “Haven’t you had enough of invading my private spaces?” 

His eyes roll as he holds up his hands, “I thought we were friendlier than this captain. Also, in my defense, your door was unlocked.”

Isabel’s eye twitches.

“Get out.”

“That's rude.”

“Get. Out.”

Jacobi grabs her wrist, twists, and makes her release him and her teeth clatter together as she grits them. “Why? So you can sit around and wallow until your little play dates with Minkowski and Eiffel?”

Isabel’s hand twitches at her side but she doesn’t reach out to grab him again. Her eyes narrow and she bares her teeth at him. “Have I told you you’re an asshole recently Jacobi? Because you’re a royal  _ fucking _ asshole.”

He has the audacity to smirk at her, “And has anyone told you recently, Lovelace, that you’re depressed?”

The callous way in which he throws the word in her face has her drawing up short. Jacobi’s always been good at laying traps, planting bombs that will blow up in the faces of the least suspecting. She didn’t realize such a talent extended to his conversational skills. She feels her shoulders starting to hunch up -- defensive. She’s getting defensive and he’ll use that as a tool as sure as he would any chemical or electric charge. Isabel breathes in slowly, forcing her shoulders down, forcing her glare to soften slightly and a smirk to play on her lips. “Funny joke Jacobi. You sure you’re not projecting?”

He didn’t rise to the bait like she had expected, like she had gotten used to on that journey back to earth. She thought she had gotten to know him in the time spent between tearing Goddard down and the two of them getting drunk at bars, commiserating that they were the only two who had had nothing to return to on Earth. He subverted her expectations and simply stared at her with those dark brown eyes. They were as intense as they had been at any serious moment on the Hephaestus and the Urania. He wasn’t joking, and that had her hackles raising. “Listen, I don’t need you psychoanalyzing me. I went to therapy just the same as the rest of you. I’m not depressed, so get your stupid skinny ass out of my house before I throw you out bodily myself.”

“I’m not here to attack you Lovelace-”

“Sure fucking seems like it.”

“I’m not.” His tone is sharp, not his usual taunting one. He stands but doesn’t move towards her. Still, the room suddenly feels too small for the two of them both to be in it. Her arm is going numb, there’s a static building in her ears and she grits her teeth until she can hear it over his next words. “I’m here because Minkowski’s got her own emotional shit going on and Eiffel wouldn’t know depression from a tea kettle at the moment. So someone’s gonna have to hold you accountable to the truth you’re refusing to see.”

“You’re accusing me of not seeing the truth? That’s rich. How long did it take you to take your blinders off, huh bomb boy?”

“This is different.” Again his words are biting, but they’re still not accusatory. She watches as Jacobi breathes in, calming himself. “You won’t see the truth because it’s affecting you directly. When was the last time you did your laundry? Or took a shower without having to spend three hours gearing yourself up? When was the last time you went to sleep without spending hours staring at the ceiling, wondering if everything was worth this end?” His words are almost soft and Isabel wants to tear him apart for it. “I’m not judging you for this. I know what it’s like, I want you to get help Isabel, dammit. Because you deserve to remember what it’s like to be alive on Earth, not fighting for your life every moment in space.”

Jacobi’s words are soft, coaxing, and she feels all the fire drain out of her. Her shoulders slump and his lips quirk up in the slightest smirk of victory. “It’s not going to be easy, but I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”

His words almost sound like something a friend might say. 

And maybe she’s not alone as she thought. Sure, she’s the only one who was remade by the Listeners, but hadn’t Eiffel lost some part of himself up there? Jacobi had lost his faith in the system he had devoted his life to, and Minkowski had failed people. There were people who understood her here on this earth. There were people who were just as uncertain about their future as her. 

She rolls her shoulders, feeling the joints crack and pop and resettle in a new alignment of determination. “Alright,” she says firmly, “where do you suggest I start, oh wise one?”

It’ll be a slow journey, she realizes as Jacobi sits back down and gestures for her to join him on the couch. But maybe it won’t be a lonely one. And maybe this is the first step towards a larger goal to work for. For now though, listening to Jacobi speak, Isabel decides maybe she can stop trying to focus on a huge goal. Maybe her next milestone is just the next day, and the one after that.

That’s what her life becomes. Each goal is small: make it to movie night with Eiffel, make it to brunch with Renee, go to therapy with Daniel waiting in the car for her afterwards so she doesn’t have to drive home with her body feeling unreal. And it’s slow, frustratingly slow, but everyday she makes it to is a victory. Every day where the static is a little less is an improvement. And some days she slips, some days she loses time, but every day she feels a little bit more human than before.

And Isabel learns to be content with that. 


End file.
